Lucasfilm’s J.W. Rinzler Talks About The Making of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

In celebration of the 30th anniversary of The Empire Strikes Back, Lucasfilm is releasing a comprehensive history of the making of the groundbreaking film, aptly titled The Making of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. The book is packed with hundreds of rarely seen behind the scene photographs which you can preview here. Over the next few days, VF Daily will be running a series of interviews coinciding with the release. Tune in later this week for an interview with legendary director Irvin Kershner.

J.W. Rinzler—described by Lucasfilm as their own Indiana Jones—is the author of The Making of Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. VF Daily spoke to Rinzler about the trials and tribulations behind the production of the legendary film—a production Lucas financed himself, that was barraged by cost overruns and shooting schedule disasters. Rinzler discusses the differences between Leigh Brackett’s original script and what we actually saw on screen, Harrison Ford’s secret rewrites, Empire producer Kary Kurtz’s recent accusations in the Los Angeles Times, and, most importantly: Why exactly did the Millennium Falcon keep breaking down during Empire?Mike Ryan: A few weeks ago, Star Wars and Empire producer Gary Kurtz was quoted in the Los Angeles Times saying that he left the series because it became too concerned about marketing toys. According to your book, it appears he was on his way out anyway.

(A Lucasfilm representative interrupted and mentioned that they’re not quite ready to comment on thatLos Angeles Timesstory. Later, Lucasfilm issued this statement to VF Daily, “TheLos Angeles Times interviewis riddled with inaccuracies. Jonathan’s book contains a factual and comprehensive account of the events surrounding the making ofThe Empire Strikes Back.”)

J.W. Rinzler: What happened is in the Empire book, based on archival interviews and production material. My whole take on these “making of” books that are done 30 years later is to use archival materials, mostly because it reestablishes everybody’s feelings at the time—the apprehension at the time. For Empire, what was interesting about hearing (author) Alan Arnold’s original tapes was that, even though Star Wars was such a huge hit, there was no guarantee that a sequel was going to do any kind of business like the first one. They were really worried about it, and George really went out on a limb by financing it himself.

Irvin Kershner is an interesting subject in this book. Anyone who knows anything about Star Wars knows that Empire is Kershner’s movie. Back then, people assumed he was George’s puppet. He even got pretty offended in an interview right before the film’s release.

Right. At the time he said, “Am I being treated just as a hired gun? No, I poured my heart and soul into this movie.” As did George. I think Harrison Ford has a quote in there where he says, “It’s great that you have two people who were so much in sync.” And I think that’s really the key, is that they really did work well together. The actors obviously worked with Kershner, but then you have all the Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) people who worked almost exclusively with George. But George was running the show and he wrote the script—which, I think, is an important thing to note.

You mention Harrison Ford. It seems like today that Harrison almost has a “too cool for Star Wars” attitude. But, in this book, no one comes off caring more about his character than Harrison.

Yeah, that’s a good point. I don’t know if I’d say more than the others, because I think Mark Hamill, in particular, deserves a heck of a lot of credit for Empire.

He did have the longest shoot.

Yeah, he had the longest shoot. He had to work with R2-D2, which was an empty shell at times. And the Yoda puppet where all he was getting on his headphones was The Rolling Stones, and nobody knew at that point who was going to do the voice. Frank [Oz’s] voice on-set doesn’t sound like Yoda, and [Mark] did an incredible, incredible performance. I think he’s the unsung hero of the original saga.

I mention Harrison because Kershner seemed to bounce a lot of ideas off Ford— almost as a co-director—which ended up angering Carrie Fisher.

He comes up with a lot of good lines. It’s just in his nature. My guess is that he’s like that in a lot of films that he works on. When he’s working on the film, he’s getting paid a lot of money and he really pours himself into it. And if he can come up with a better line and the director thinks it’s a better line, then they’ll probably use it.

Did you read Leigh Brackett’s entire first draft of Empire?

Oh, yeah. I read through every draft of every script.

The sections that you put into this book are so drastically different than anything that’s actually in the movie. I’m assuming the entire script is like that?

Yeah. And I read George’s notes on her script. He starts by trying to make very detailed edits. Then, around page 30, he started writing “No” across the whole page. It just wasn’t working.

It’s covered briefly in the book, but I’ve always wondered why they cut so much of the Wampas attacking the Rebel base subplot from the final film.

Well, I think part of it is the usual whittling down, where you have a very ambitious story, and you just can’t get in because of time and money. The basic problem was that they didn’t have a concept look for the Wampa that ended up working. They built this huge costume and they guy in it couldn’t really move. I don’t know if it’s going to be on the Blu-ray or anything, but there is film of this guy walking in the wind and snow, and it looks like his legs are going to crack off every time he falls. He falls after two or three steps—he basically can’t move. Later, the guys at ILM thought the creature looked really silly and they redesigned him for those insert shots. And then also realizing there was just too much stuff going on in the beginning and they really didn’t need it. As many people point out, what's great about the Millennium Falcon is that it's just not working. That makes it great: this great old car that has bugs in it. Where, originally, it was the Wampas shaking the Falcon that cause it to have things go wrong with it later. Or because the Imperial Troopers shoot it. In the end, it was better to not have any explanation why it's not working.

Is there anything not in the book that you wish had made it in there?

The only thing that happens is once the book goes to print, other things always surface. In this case, it’s the Yoda puppet being rediscovered in the archives, which is in the director’s cut you guys are going to show.

What were you most surprised by in your research?

The fact that there were so many financial problems in getting it made. They had to fool around with the payroll because the money had literally just dried up and they were only two-thirds done. George had to fly over and be on the set every day. On the sets of lots of movies, it’s pure chaos and it can really fall apart—and it came really close to falling apart.

After reading the book, I wouldn’t describe this as an unhappy cast. But there are many times where the cast isn’t happy.

I think they got along. But like any arduous task, tempers frayed at certain points. And as Mark says, it wasn’t as fun because they were hardly ever together. I believe they only had one or two scenes together.

Carrie Fisher has addressed her substance abuse problems at the time extensively, but it was jarring to read about it in this context. The fact that she had to go home early quite a bit because she was “sick.”

Well it was obvious she wasn’t just sick all of the time. She was a young kid living in London, going to parties and all of that stuff.

I laughed out loud during the transcripts of the carbon freezing scene. Everyone is a mess, Harrison and Carrie are in a huge argument, Kershner is trying to keep he whole thing from falling apart. Then, out of nowhere, David Prowse interrupts Kershner and tries to give him a signed copy of his new book, Fitness is Fun.

It’s funny you mention that. Another editor here, who obviously has to read it because I wrote it, was in the other room reading that part and started laughing and practically fell out of his chair at the same moment. Prowse has quite a few funny moments in the book, I thought. Like in the beginning where he says that his wife is born again and he’s the icon of pure evil, so it’s causing a problem in their marriage.

Empire was the first movie that I ever saw in a theater, and it’s had a lifelong effect on me. It’s still my favorite movie of all time. Do you think there will be someone who, in 2032, will feel the same way about Attack of the Clones? Empire means a lot to a lot of people.

When you see movies, a lot depends on your age. For me, American Graffiti had a bigger effect than Star Wars because I was younger. It spoke to me. It was huge. It was a life changing experience. Star Wars was big, too, but I was already 15 when it came out and it didn’t have as big of an effect. But kids who see Episodes I, II, and III when they’re 8, 9, or 10—it’s huge. And it’s because these movies are unlike any other movies that come out. They have a lot of depth to them, and they have different dimensions and aliens and creatures. Somehow, George makes it look easy. But if it were easy, there would be a lot more Star Wars out there—and there aren’t.